FISH QUESTION FOR you expert anglers: What’s brown, green, orange and yellow, and bright silver with big spots?
The answer is the gamefish species, native and exotic, that you can expect to catch in a day fishing south Florida waters.
In most lakes in the southeast U.S., bass are king. The top predator rules the waters with an iron hand; few fish seriously compete.
On the other hand, in most south Florida lakes and fish-filled canals, there’s no telling what sort of gamefish will be the first to whack a lure or bait. That uncertainty spices up this fishery, unique in the nation, in a particularly exciting way.
Native Floridians (a rare breed anymore) have long complained of Northern “snowbirds” who visit the southern part of the state, decide they like the climate and never go home. Well, the same is true of all sorts of fauna. While critters like Burmese pythons and monster lizards — iguanas and nine species of monitors, including the 6-foot Nile monitor — capture lots of headlines, the list of non-native fish that in the past few decades have established permanent populations is simply too long to list here. No, they didn’t swim up from South America or over from Africa, but they had human help. Most of these invasive species came to be here one way or another from the aquarium trade and hobbyists. If “tropical fish” up North are dumped into lakes or streams by thoughtless
